hi all
seems one of those weeks where the tt adventure a few weeks ago seems a distant memory so got me thinking ahead to new adventures in bikey land and got me thinking that there will be racing near my french house soon if i can get down which is unlikely at moment but thought id share it with fellow loonies.
near my house in a village called nouziers they block off the road for a 24hr race using the old velo cycle bikes...... its a right noise and iv seen it a few times and sounds like chainsaws running flat out, they are tuned like crazy and do mad speeds for what they are
heres a video and he does put his head up after a minute lol

my mom had one of those moments a couple of weeks ago just before she went to france she bumped into the nutty ex and her jesse james affair partner while she was out on her pushbike, they were sticking fingers up and hurling obcenities at me poor 75 yr old mom !!!!! jesse james in his gear & ex vs 75 yr old woman on pushbike hmmmmmmmm grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ....... wont say what methinks
mom's ok happily buggering off to the french place along with dad for a couple of weeks but dad broke me ride on mower hitting an over sized mole hill snapping the drive belt yesterday but frenchy neighbors have sorted it for them.....apparently the mice have also stolen all my bottles of french wine in the wine rack !!!!!! need a mouse trap hahaha bloody parents
have fun all
anthony

Those Velo bikes, are they the ones with the engine mounted above the front wheel? Years ago all the 14 year old French kids used to ride them to school. Kicking out time was a bit like the start of a bike stampede....

hi and yes those are the ones small 50cc engines on the bike wheel and they take it super seriously with all the mechanics and teams and it is fun to watch if a bit rough on the ears.......of course there are a few racing around on standard bikes

Speaking of bikes abroad..A few years ago I sailed my boat into the harbour at Carlo Forte which is on a small island off the West coast of Sardinia. Dropped anchor and after a few minutes the Harbour Master came out in a motor boat. Anyone old enough to remember Laurel and Hardy? Well this was a tubbier, Italian version of Oliver Hardy...without the bowler hat.

Collected his Harbour dues and offered me a lift into town to buy supplies. Bet he's got a little Fiat 500 I thought. Nope....a Honda 90!!!
The next 10 minutes were the scariest of my life..sitting on the last 2 inches of seat not occupied by his massive bum, I clung onto the carrier rack as he screamed the thing towards town.
He knew every bugger, so they all got a yell and a wave, which meant he let go of the bars and the bike swooped across the road out of control every time. Being on the "wrong" side of the road felt bad enough but the prat swerved around every pot hole and there were lots of them. Feck the on coming traffic, swerve round the pot holes....

Numb with shock and soaked in sweat I got off the bike with wobbly legs when we reached town. The taxi back to the boat with the shopping felt well worth the money....

My very firdt bike was a Honda PC50. a friend of the family used to go sprinting and he came accross a 50cc supercharger and a gave it to me as a joke more than anything. I thought he was being serious and I managed to fit it witha bit of jiggery pokery. (A Lot of jiggery pokery in fact!) I mangaed to get it working of a fashion, for a bit! Manged to out strip me mates on their fizzies etc, for a week or two, then went BOOM, big time! Well I was only 17, and more interested in speed and trying to keep up with me mates! the top wack must have only been about 45 ish but speed was phenominal, definately out stripped most of the popular 50's knocking around at that time. Just the standard 50cc step through engine was not design to cope with being being put under the strain of a supercharger ( basically it looked like a washing machine engine bolted on the side/front!) and blew the internals to all four corners of the earth!

thanks and yes im certainly up for some foreign adventures that get me out this town, my first bike was a fsie and was tuned up a lot too but as yours friar tuck it continually blew itself apart from the thrashing i gave it......an old friend on a 125 never forgave me for overtaking him on my moped although it took from stratford to alcester to edge past him
couldnt imagine what a supercharged moped would be like but made me laugh thinking of that hahaha and begs the question do bikers ever get sensible !!!!!!
mad max moped lol

My very firdt bike was a Honda PC50. a friend of the family used to go sprinting and he came accross a 50cc supercharger and a gave it to me as a joke more than anything. I thought he was being serious and I managed to fit it witha bit of jiggery pokery. (A Lot of jiggery pokery in fact!) I mangaed to get it working of a fashion, for a bit! Manged to out strip me mates on their fizzies etc, for a week or two, then went BOOM, big time! Well I was only 17, and more interested in speed and trying to keep up with me mates! the top wack must have only been about 45 ish but speed was phenominal, definately out stripped most of the popular 50's knocking around at that time. Just the standard 50cc step through engine was not design to cope with being being put under the strain of a supercharger ( basically it looked like a washing machine engine bolted on the side/front!) and blew the internals to all four corners of the earth!

The PC50/90 did not have a pressurised oil feed to the big end, to save money, the Japs built a scoop to the bottom of the big end which scooped oil from the sump and fed it to the big end bearing. However, when the bearings started to wear, the scoop would dip lower and lower till it hit the bottom of the sump, then no oil would reach the bearing. The result of this is much as FT describes... I blew up a 90 commuting over Crystal Palace (the steepest hill in London) on a daily basis......

oh the nostalgia of remembering that over tuned fsie failing to start on a work day........my mom reminds me occassionally how i used to shout abuse at it when it misbehaved which was nearly all the time and of the group of friends that used to ride around that also had mopeds then i'm the only one with bikes now
after i turned 17 i had a honda 400 hondamatic with a sidecar which the chair fell off going into town so a friend built me a coffin to fit on instead those were the days of side winders and stuff but many adventures were had thats for sure with us all off on weekend rallies, i passed my test and bought a honda 900 and mom had a forty fit buying such a big bike at 18

after that i bought an unfinished suzuki 750 chop via a friend who worked with if my memory serves me right a member of the pagan's and dont know why but at the time alcester seemed to get loads of different bike groups stopping by at the moat house which was good fun, then heard there had been some huge kick off over at their leamington club house..............didnt get anymore party invites after that but at 18 odd we didnt care where we went partying which we did somewhere in the uk most weekend's.

that just about covers my teen years with bikes but do miss all that rally stuff though partying away in the middle of no where
on with the fun iv a kawasaki in bits re-doing exaust gaskets booooooo
anthony